Interstitial
by saoulbete
Summary: Their love is interstitial, it exists in the gaps, the spaces between. They do not talk of it as talking of it would be all too real.


an this is a present from work. hates letting you edit on a cell phone apologies for any mistakes theyll be cleaned up when i get home. this was originally something i had written for a completely different fandom that got cleaned up and edited and refined to become this

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their love is interstitial, it exists in the gaps and the spaces between. It doesn't take up any part of them, but is rather the glue that holds all those parts together. It is something that goes unspoken of, the tetragrammaton of their relationship. It exists, but only as a concept, something that is too big, too beyond them to be spoken of. Speaking of it will make it concrete, make it a _thing _rather than just an idea. It's one thing to have the idea of love, but it's another to turn this _concept_ of feelings and emotions into a feeling or emotion.

So they don't speak of it. They make no mention of what it is that they have. They do not try to define it, do not try to give it a name. It is is simply _there_. They have no reason to speak of it, no reason to mention it. After all, it's not as though they have any need to describe themselves – what they are to each other – to the world around them.

They don't want to put a name to what they have. Don't want to think about what they are to each other, what they mean to each other. It's not something they enjoy thinking about, not something they want to dwell on. They prefer to simply revel in the simple beauty of it, rather than to analyze it. It is inevetable that they do, of course, and they realise that when they're forced to think about their relationship, about what it is is, the thoughts only bring pain.

It is something that is too good to last, and they both know it. It's one of the reasons that they refuse to talk about whatever it is they have. Because to talk about it would show that they did, in fact, mean something to each other, something more than BFFs forever. No, it was easier to lie to themselves, and even in their own thoughts think of themselves as nothing more than friends. Nothing more than coworkers. Nothing more than detective and medical examiner, and never anything more than that.

But they both know that they've got a good thing going, and they do not risk it carelessly. They do not bandy what they have going about, showing it to the world. They keep it locked away in dark corners of rooms in the dark of night. To the world at large, there is nothing there. When they do communicate, it's in a secret silent language of stares and sighs. They do not need to speak, they can read the little longing glances, the quirks of an eyebrow, the slump of shoulders, the careless chewing of a pencil, a twirl of the hair. They do not need to ask if the other is wanting, they can simply sense it and simply _know. _They are always wanting, always _needing._

They talk of Plato at times, curled around each other on cold winter nights, staring up at the ceiling, tracing lazy patterns around each toned stomach, or across the gentle planes of a back. About the theory that lovers are one soul, cleft in twain. They scoff at the idea, while secretly wondering if it is true. They laugh at the idea of true love, mocking those that believe in such silly notions. They giggle over the idea of ever being someone's _little lambykin. _They pretend to laugh at the soppy notions expressed in the romantic comedies they so often watch together, and they hope to get the happy ending that is always promised therein.

They act as though it's completely normal for _best friends_ to spend their nights wrapped around each other, laying gentle kisses across vast expanses of flesh. It is easier than accepting the reality. It is easier than acknowledging that what they have is something more. That it is something greater than them, greater than the sum of its parts. It's easier to deny everything, than it is to ever attempt to confront the feelings that they keep buried. They act as though what they're doing is perfectly acceptable in the staid world of the police department, the very traditional, very catholic world of Boston, and keep a vigilant eye to make sure their secret is safe.

They wear their masks, and keep _this_ quiet, so that they do not have to consider just how utterly fucking _lost_ they'd be without the other. There are times, on quiet, lonely nights when circumstances dictate that they must be apart – cases that run to all hours of the night, charity events where it would simply not be proper for Jane to be a plus-one – where they wonder if this is love, or if it is some twisted perversion of it, forged out of their mutual brokenness. They wonder what they department shrink would say about them, before they drink up and forget it.

They do not push their unspoken boundaries. They live within the carefully constructed walls that they did not have to speak about to forge. They never talk about what it is they have. Instead, they simply live on, laughing about their situation, and pretending to lie to Giovanni, and that there is nothing there. They let their love exist, filling in the gaps, never shown as such, never expressed, but simply there. It sits interstitially, the glue holding both of them together.


End file.
